“Here, Vice President Park. These are all the current files needing a signature.” I sit back and let my new assistant Veronica lay them out for me. Two days ago, I finally cut loose the girl of five years in a fit of rage for a missed document and a lax attitude to timekeeping. I have no patience for people who waste my precious time and make mistakes, and this one has all the new and shiny enthusiasm to do a good job. I know it won’t last.
“Did you archive all last month’s?” I lift a brow and pull the first black folder on top over, flicking it open.
“Yes, Ma’am. I sorted through, copied, and saved digital files to the central server and organized the paper copies in the building file room.”
“Why is this missing President Park’s signature?” I pause my pen over the budget request for one of our sub-companies. The very first one I open, it’s not even completed. Irritated by the oversight.
“He must have missed it, Ma’am. It came from his secretary only moments ago. I’ll take it back.” Her face pales, and her voice fades, showing the same fear most of the employees in the building have for me. I throw down my pen on top of it with a harsh thrush and slam it shut, locking the pen inside. Already in a foul mood this morning, like most days, I wake up and blow out my air violently.
Inwardly I’m coiled tight, and although this isn’t a significant oversight, I can’t hold in the anger. This last week or so, I feel like he’s let so many tiny things like this slide, and I have no idea what’s wrong with him. His focus is elsewhere, and he’s been distracted in meetings to the point he’s had to have things repeated. Yesterday he missed a digit on a payment account and almost lost a substantial amount in an overpay if I hadn’t caught it. These are not Jyeon mistakes, ever.
“I’ll do it. He’ll be quicker if I take it to him myself. Don’t let this happen again. Check paperwork before letting it be handed over.” I snap at her. Pushing my chair back and standing briskly, I catch the pen as it slides out from the file and shove it into my jacket pocket.
I’m in hurricane mode today, built up from a lack of sleep and too much stress these past weeks, and she shouldn’t intervene if she values her life. I waste no time marching out and along the corridor, scowling his secretary’s way to tell her not even to try stopping me today, and she recoils back in her seat. Instantly meek and says nothing as I swing into his doorway.
His seat is empty, his desk is notably tidy, and there are no signs of him. I look around for him, knowing he hasn’t left. Something like sixth sense tells me he’s here. She would have told me that, at least, even with my death glare.
“Jyeon?” I yell out and spot his dressing room door ajar in the far corner, past his lounge recess. He doesn’t reply, so I walk over and open it fully, seeing him standing in front of his full-length mirror as he changes his shirt. Already a fresh one on and yet unbuttoned as he fixes it around his neck and adjusts the cuffs. He knows I’m here but ignores me and isn’t phased about seeing him half-naked. It’s not like I haven’t before.
“I need this signed. I have to process it, and you missed it.” I hold out the file his way, snappish and annoyed at the oversight, trying not to admire that well-maintained physique. He’s always been tall and athletic with a nicely cut body. Dressed like this, in pants and an open white shirt, it pains me in my stomach to still be this attracted to him. I could never fault him for how he looks or his sense of style. Jyeon would be the poster boy for dream man if we graded them on looks.
He turns to me and reaches for it, his shirt falling further open, and I spot the fading bruises across his left rib cage and forget all else for a moment as instant pain hits me in the chest. Suddenly knocked off my pedestal of anger and crumbled to wimp at seeing him hurt.
“You told me you were fine.” My entire attitude and voices change dramatically. I rush forward, fingers outstretched to touch what I can see, all thoughts of anything else drop out of orbit, and only my softer me wants to heal him. I want to cry for seeing these ugly blue purplish marks on his flawless tanned skin, but he bats my hand away. Putting me in my place and bringing me back to my senses.
“I am fine. Don’t touch me.” His cold tone stops me in my tracks, and I recoil with the iciness. It’s like a physical slap, yet my eyes are glued to the marks.
“Did you at least get seen? At the hospital, I mean.” I stammer out. Melting all icebergs in my heart and feeling for him because I know these are what happened when he protected me that day outside.
“They’re bruises, Sohla. Not life-threatening. I get worse from playing racketball with Bryant. Give me a pen.” He doesn’t look my way but instead flicks through the papers and holds out his hand expectantly. Shutting me down, rejecting my touch, and drawing that line in the sand. The cycle of our relationship.
I rifle in my pocket and hand him the fountain pen, and he makes sure not to touch my fingers as he takes it. Any softness or show of care from Jyeon is followed by weeks of him pushing me further away, so I don’t misunderstand what was a momentary lapse of judgment for him. How could I ever forget that?
“Why are you getting changed? Where are you going?” I bite my lip to curb the reaction to the wound he gives me with every cold rebuff and paste on the ‘I don’t care’ persona. Mentally telling myself that his bruises are nothing and I shouldn’t keep on at him.
“Lunch date. I’ll be back by two. Anything else can wait until then.”
“With whom? All company meetings go through me.” I reply in surprise, eyes widening as I try to mentally figure out who he could be meeting, especially without my knowledge. I’m thrown by seeing him hurt, and it’s knocked off my usual blank self.
“I never said it was a company meeting.” He signs my form and hands it back to me in record time with a thrust, not once looking me in the eye, and goes back to fixing his shirt before buttoning it up and leaving the top two open. His leaving his shirt half done like that irks me. I know his return to getting ready and acting like I’m not here is a signal I should go, but something inside me roots me to the spot.
“No tie? That’s not like you.” My voice trembles so subtly that I curse myself for being weak. Jyeon doesn’t reply. He wanders over to a large gift bag on his chair and pulls out a leather jacket I’ve never seen before. Shakes it out and admires it for a second before yanking the tag from the inside off and sliding it on.
“It’s a casual lunch. If we’re done, can you ….” He motions to his door with a hand flicker, and I honestly don’t know what to say. Watching him pull on that jacket sends my insides into a convoluted, chaotic mess, as it’s neither his style nor something I have ever known him to purchase. And when? He doesn’t shop for clothes online, and it’s been months since he last took a day off to do anything like that. He always accepts the things I buy as I know his taste and find the time to get him clothes every few weeks.
“This is new, right?” Checking closer that I genuinely have never seen this jacket. I walk forward, pasting on a smile, and pull at his collar as though it’s twisted and I’m being helpful while it’s an excuse to drag out this conversation.
“Hmmm” He pulls the fabric out of my hands, shrugging me away as though he can’t stand my closeness, and fixes it himself, stepping away from me. The wall is going up, and his signals scream that he wants space.
“When did you pick it up/” I eye up the branded bag, not recognizing it at all, but the quality seems high-end and not high street. “It’s not a brand you usually shop for.”
“It was a gift. Nothing wrong with trying something different for a change.” He turns and throws me a brief, strange look. A weird glance as though telling me something but not committing to look at me and then walks off. Leaving me in here as he goes back into his office without a backward glance.
My heart flips over, that insane gut feeling from the night he took out his sports car hits me again, and I find myself impulsively leaning out to look inside the bag for any card or note and see nothing. The bag is empty save for some tissue paper, yet the faint scent of familiar perfume lingers around it.
I freeze up. My hand is on the edge of the thick paper, and my stomach lurches into my mouth as I stand there motionless for a blank second. It’s the perfume I wear, and I know where I once smelled it. It’s a sensation like a sucker punch to the gut and ice-cold water thrown in my face simultaneously as my brain puts two and two together and gets a complicated response.
My hand shakes, and I straighten myself up, my legs suddenly weak, arguing with my flawed sense of logic that I’m overreacting and being overly suspicious, but I can’t stop the growing nausea inside me. I turn and walk after him into the bright room, and he’s already at his desk, leaning over and putting things in order so he can leave.
“Who gifted something so expensive? Something so not you? A client? A friend? Why am I only just hearing this?” I sound exactly like one of those over-possessive jealous wives in movies and hate myself for letting this crack in my mask show. Pushing down nausea and rising hysteria.
“Don’t ask me about my personal life, and I won’t ask you about yours. What is this now, Sohla?” he doesn’t look at me, only picks up his cell and car keys and slides them into his pocket before straightening up. It only pushes me into further madness as I swirl uncontrollably inside, and my entire mental state rocks.
“A woman? It smells like perfume… my perfume.” I spit in accusation, breathless.
“It sat in our wardrobe the last few days; it probably smells of your perfume. That’s where you put it on. Don’t do this.” He dodges me again, his tone unconvincing, and I have the urge to run over and shake him. A violent hurt racks up from my toes, and I want to scream the words out at him to answer the fucking question.
“You’re saying it’s not from a woman?” I state through gritted teeth to keep my cool, panic gripping my heart.
“I’m leaving. Please don’t start this. We don’t have that kind of relationship, and I’m not in the mood to be interrogated.” Jyeon doesn’t give me another second of his time. He flips his laptop shut in haste and stalks out of the room, leaving the door to swing shut behind him, and yet like a sad, pathetic, desperate lover, I follow him. I clench my fists and try to calm my erratic breathing.
“You can’t leave. We have a crisis meeting to call. We have issues with the distribution chain for the flex company.” I’m grasping at straws, knowing I don’t want him to go wherever he’s going and whoever gave him that jacket. It’s intuition, a heart begging another heart not to betray them.
“You handle it. You always do just fine without me. You always will.” It’s a weird tone, lacking emotion, and I finally get another look thrown back my way. Only it’s a wary and dark expression that I can’t read, and I feel like he’s giving me subtle messages.
I want to scream at him, run after him, and cling to him, but I’m aware of the receptionist right at my left and how quickly rumors would fly if I behaved insanely. I take a deep breath and paste on a blank expression, steeling my inward trembles and pulling a carefree attitude from god knows where. I am reverting to the cold and bland me that I know Jyeon hates the most.
“I’ll see you at two pm then,” I call after him, and Jyeon doesn’t acknowledge me at all. Just walks away.
I wait until he’s out of sight and turn and stalk back into his office, bee-lining right for the dressing room and I yank the bag out of the chair and tip it upside down. So all the tissue paper falls out, and I shake it ruthlessly to dislodge anything inside, finding nothing at all.
The smell of my perfume is ingrained into it as though it’s been held by someone wearing it. Or maybe he’s right, and I didn’t see it in our walk-in closet, and it absorbed my perfume from the air. I turn it back over and flip it, so the brand name faces me, pull out my cell phone and google it. Knowing I’m being stupid, it’s like I’m possessed.
It’s a local domestic brand with one store because they’re an up-and-coming small boutique that hand-makes everything they sell. The upside is that they boast unique and one-of-a-kind items, so no two are the same, making this easier to track. My finger hovers over the listed phone number, and I mentally pause. Shaking from head to toe and telling myself not to do this.
Live in ignorance, don’t scratch the surface. Let it go. We can go on living as we are, and that’s enough. I can leave this boat unrocked and ignore this feeling inside of me. It’s better to look the other way and act like there’s nothing there for my sanity.
His weird behavior lately, distracted focus, and veiled messages whenever we talk. The gut feeling inside of me not only started recently but lingered from just before he had that girl in his office. I’ve felt something off for weeks and couldn’t put my finger on it.
I press it despite myself and hold my cell to my ear with ice-cold hands and a pit growing so heavy inside of me I feel like my legs may cave in.
“Hello, Favcoanda designer clothing. How can I help you?”
“Hello there, I’m calling to find out if you have a purchase record on a coat that was left in my company by mistake. It has your brand on the label and seems very expensive, but we have no way to source the owner.” I coolly lie through my teeth. Bold in doing so, I have to lean against the wall to steady myself as dizziness takes hold. My heart is hammering painfully inside my chest.
“Oh, if you brought it to the store, we could see if we have the payment record for that transaction, but we only have that on a non-cash transaction. We don’t keep records for every item.” She has a bubbly, upbeat voice of a young person, and I close my eyes to simmer my tone.
“Can’t I just describe it, and you could tell me who owns it, we’re a massive and busy company, and I want to return it before the end of the day.”
“I’m sorry we can’t hand out customer's details, but we’d be happy to contact them and have them collect from here if you have someone drop it off.”
I chew my lip, cursing under my breath, knowing when I’m defeated. Mentally wracking my brain on how to find out and knowing I would have to take it from Jyeon when he didn’t notice to have them check.
“Right. I’ll do that. Thank you for your time.”
After cutting the call, I angrily throw the bag down and kick it across the floor. Leaving it there as I walk out in anger and push through the outer door to go. Stamping my steps and growing heated with everyone.
I catch sight of his receptionist in my peripheral, recoiling away from me and shriveling small to go unseen, and she irritates me. That meek personality doesn’t seem to annoy him among our female staff, and I just don’t get it. I swing past and stop dead in my tracks as a thought hits me right in the forehead.
“Dee?” I pause, stilling every nerve in my body, and turn to her with a suddenly smiling and probably terrifying demeanor. I usually never give this girl the time of day.
“Yes, Vice President Park?” Shocked I would directly address her. She blinks rapidly, like a rabbit caught in the headlights, intimidated and afraid of me.
“Do you know who he is meeting for lunch? He forgot to specify.” I ask outright, daring her to try and lie to me, and she seems to pale visibly.
“Ummmm, the liaison for a company we’re investing in, I believe. He arranged it himself today.”
My heart almost stops in my chest. I falter, blink, and then catch myself before it’s obvious and smile even brighter.
“Biochem?” I state it blankly, devoid of reaction, even if my heart turns to rock in my chest and ceases to beat. A fluttering yet also painful stab inside of me.
“I think so.”